"Providence" by Yusef Komunyakaa
(The Vintage Book of Contemporary American Poetry, pages 534-536)
Komunyakaa discusses the "power of words" in an essay discussing Jazz Poetry on poets. org. Of all the poems I read and listened to, "Providence" seemed to tap into that power in a most interesting way.
1. Simple words paired together to create new, specific nouns. Examples: love apples, perfect hunger, moon-pulled fish, dung-scented ark, black hush, night weather, 1/2 stunned yes, fat juice, naked wing.
2. Each of the new nouns are closely followed by regular, almost cliche pairings. Examples: seven roads, red bird, wet leaves, dull day, dark lipstick, western horizon, hanging fruit.
3. The expected and unexpected are at odds in this poem. The expected pairings of words closely followed by the unexpected pairings.
4. Use of ampersands instead of writing the word "and". This symbols causes you to read it differently than if it were a word. The connection does not seem as clear as when you have a word. The symbol almost stops the connection and gets in the reader's way.
5. 7 lines per stanza, 9 stanzas with 7-10 syllables in each line. Perhaps this has something to do with the rhythm and meter of jazz poetry.
6. Only three stanzas start with pronouns. The first and third stanzas begin with "I" and the sixth stanza begins with "We". This is not the only time pronouns are used, but it is the only time they are used a the beginning of a stanza.
7. Most of the verbs used are in the past tense. However, the 1st line of most stanzas contain a gerund. No pattern is immediately apparent, but they seem to be mixed evenly through the poem.
8. Most of the words are Latinate and appeal mostly to abstracts. Examples: requited, memory, glimpse, nestled.
9. .Aletheia. Is the only thing italicized in this poem. Aletheia: the state of not being hidden-truth.
10. The title-Providence (god centered care or direction for humans) becomes an interesting name for this poem in light of all of the personal pronouns and past and active verbs. The title seems to suggest a disconnect between the speaker, the title, and some higher power.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Week 2, Response to Classmate's Journal (M. Brown/Calisthenics Week 2)
I think that Michael touches on an interesting conundrum with his statement " Meaningful? Probably Not. Pretty neat? Oh, yeah.". I meant even add, "Hells Yeah". My reasoning for agreeing is my own calisthenics exercise this week where I did something similar to Micheal. In doing so, I found all of these words that I wouldn't usually encounter in my daily grind. For example, Xanthus. I found it; I looked it up; I wrote it; I learned. (It's the horse Achilles rode into the Trojan War given as a wedding gift from Poseidon. The horses were created by Zephyrus.) In using that allusion that I pulled randomly, it actually gave my practice some weight, an anchor to hold onto for perhaps future sign inventory and work. Micheal's recognition of the Greek references acting as a common thread in his "found poem" can be a great jumping off point for other exercises that may lead to richer imagery and specific language.
Week 2, Improv
As I read through Moore's poetry and essays, I found it interesting that she was a huge baseball fan. I think often sports and poetry are represented as opposite sides of the spectrum. Yet, it seems that both contain a great deal of art and a specific, almost coded, language. So, since I spend about most of my life watching football in the Fall, and now, I am spending the other half practicing poetry, I wanted to improv off of this poem.
Baseball and Writing - Marianne Moore
Post Game Broadcast
Assign Yogi Berra to Cape Canaverdi
he could handle one missile
He is not feather. "Strike!...Strike 2!
Fouled back. A blur,
it's gone. You could infer
that the bat had eyes.
He put the wood to that one.
Praised, Skowron says, "Thanks, Mel.
I think I helped a little bit."
All business, each, and modesty.
Blanchard, Richardson, Kubek, Boyer.
In that galazy of nine, say which
won the pennant? Each. It was he.
Give Bear Bryant the mic
he can inspire any bonehead-that hits.
He is no dog fight-just the dog. "Blitz!...Sack!"
Dead ball. A bomb,
it's fumbled. She could interfere-
the skin at midfield.
He picked off that kid.
Encroached, Payton said, "Fourth Comeback-
I'm the best Manning."
All business, turf, and green.
Walker, Green, Kinnick, Ruettiger.
In the clash of many, stands
all one ring. Them? It was all me.
Baseball and Writing - Marianne Moore
Post Game Broadcast
Assign Yogi Berra to Cape Canaverdi
he could handle one missile
He is not feather. "Strike!...Strike 2!
Fouled back. A blur,
it's gone. You could infer
that the bat had eyes.
He put the wood to that one.
Praised, Skowron says, "Thanks, Mel.
I think I helped a little bit."
All business, each, and modesty.
Blanchard, Richardson, Kubek, Boyer.
In that galazy of nine, say which
won the pennant? Each. It was he.
Give Bear Bryant the mic
he can inspire any bonehead-that hits.
He is no dog fight-just the dog. "Blitz!...Sack!"
Dead ball. A bomb,
it's fumbled. She could interfere-
the skin at midfield.
He picked off that kid.
Encroached, Payton said, "Fourth Comeback-
I'm the best Manning."
All business, turf, and green.
Walker, Green, Kinnick, Ruettiger.
In the clash of many, stands
all one ring. Them? It was all me.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Week 2, Free Entry
I love looking at the audience members' faces during poetry readings. Here are the types of people you see:
1. The undergraduate student there for extra credit texting secretly on their phone hoping no one will see them there.
2. The wanna-be poetry lover. They usually are wearing odd clothes with a part or large parts of their hair over their eye(s).
3. The bearded man--always there. At some intriguing moment of the reading, he will stroke his beard.
4. The poet groupy. You know, the one that laughs at all the jokes, stays after to buy all the books and gets them signed and then usually heads home, still needing more.
5. The serious poetry aficionado. They are writing words like "split couplet" and "villanelle" in some type of leather bound journal along with a Pulitzer Prize winning idea.
6. Then, there are people like me, the skeptic, wishing I had bought a coffee before I came--yet, leaving with a sense that I was part of something I don't even understand-even if I don't want to.
1. The undergraduate student there for extra credit texting secretly on their phone hoping no one will see them there.
2. The wanna-be poetry lover. They usually are wearing odd clothes with a part or large parts of their hair over their eye(s).
3. The bearded man--always there. At some intriguing moment of the reading, he will stroke his beard.
4. The poet groupy. You know, the one that laughs at all the jokes, stays after to buy all the books and gets them signed and then usually heads home, still needing more.
5. The serious poetry aficionado. They are writing words like "split couplet" and "villanelle" in some type of leather bound journal along with a Pulitzer Prize winning idea.
6. Then, there are people like me, the skeptic, wishing I had bought a coffee before I came--yet, leaving with a sense that I was part of something I don't even understand-even if I don't want to.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Week 2, Pedagody Forum
The nature of "work" in this class differs greatly from any other type of class that I have ever taken. I've noticed that when I let creative work for this class consume me, the work becomes fun. If you let a traditional class consume every thought, insanity ensues. I feel that understanding this is so important because it changes the goals for learning. Looking at the class though a creative process verses a final product, frees me, a self-proclaimed overachiever, to calm those thoughts and really do some interesting, meaningful work. I have found it very liberating to "play" with language instead of focusing on just interpretation and analysis. Through a little experiment of mine, I began thinking of this class differently this week (a different type of work), and so far, I can't wait to get home from work to examine my journals and practice writing.
Week 2, Calisthenics
When I got home from class last night, I went to poets.org and started gathering random lines.
1st Draft:
I see a lily on thy brow
its loveliness increases, it will never
you, my love still asleep in August as fair art thou, my bonnie lass
exposes dusty fissured yellow pearls
As Xanthus once, its gliding trout
Hung by a faded cord from a hole
mad-eyed from stating the obvious
your hands that I could see
and scaffolds my faith to scorn
Enters--and is lost in Balms
the rules of propagation.
In the open world green dips the leaves
and nobody comes while my husband
hoes this earth until I think of nothing.
It turns mine to wax--tiny core of two sycamores
peeling to bone white
The body's shadow turns to shape in time.
2nd Draft:
I see a lily on the brow--
its loveliness increases, it will never
sleep in August. Xanthus exposes dusty, yellow pearls
hung by a faded cord from a mad-eyed hole. Your hands scaffold
my faith and is lost in the rules of propagation
in the open world, green hoes this earth until I think of nothing.
The body's shadow turns to shape up time.
3rd Draft:
When danger's loveliness increases, it will never sleep in August.
Xanthus exposed dusty, yellow pearls
hanging by a faded chord.
A mad-eyed hole scaffolds my faith--lost in the rules of propagation.
In the open world, the earth hoes the core until I think of nothing.
The body's shadow turns, to shape up disaster.
* The underlined words are words that I came up with lists of different choices. I feel like I could continue on that venture.
1st Draft:
I see a lily on thy brow
its loveliness increases, it will never
you, my love still asleep in August as fair art thou, my bonnie lass
exposes dusty fissured yellow pearls
As Xanthus once, its gliding trout
Hung by a faded cord from a hole
mad-eyed from stating the obvious
your hands that I could see
and scaffolds my faith to scorn
Enters--and is lost in Balms
the rules of propagation.
In the open world green dips the leaves
and nobody comes while my husband
hoes this earth until I think of nothing.
It turns mine to wax--tiny core of two sycamores
peeling to bone white
The body's shadow turns to shape in time.
2nd Draft:
I see a lily on the brow--
its loveliness increases, it will never
sleep in August. Xanthus exposes dusty, yellow pearls
hung by a faded cord from a mad-eyed hole. Your hands scaffold
my faith and is lost in the rules of propagation
in the open world, green hoes this earth until I think of nothing.
The body's shadow turns to shape up time.
3rd Draft:
When danger's loveliness increases, it will never sleep in August.
Xanthus exposed dusty, yellow pearls
hanging by a faded chord.
A mad-eyed hole scaffolds my faith--lost in the rules of propagation.
In the open world, the earth hoes the core until I think of nothing.
The body's shadow turns, to shape up disaster.
* The underlined words are words that I came up with lists of different choices. I feel like I could continue on that venture.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Week 2, Junkyard Entries
I am devoting this week to Marianne Moore.
1. "So that in looking at some apparently small object, one feels the swirl of great events"-William Carlos Williams, Essay "Marianne Moore" (1925)
Specificity.
2. "Poetry", Marianne Moore (1919)
"I, too dislike it"
3. "James Joyce has been wrongly subjected to indignity by stupid people"-Marianne Moore to Ezra Pound in a letter (1921).
She goes on in the letter to use stupid several more times. I like the bluntness.
4. "mongrel art"-Marianne Moore to Ezra Pound in a letter (1921).
This makes me think of what we made today during the calisthenics.
5. I am so sorry to have missed the game at the polo grounds but I miss so much, nearly everything, that I am hardened to loss"-Marianne Moore to William Carlos Williams in a letter (1935).
Connections of loss and losing from "One Art" by Bishop. This sentence comes after a discussion of WWII and Hitler.
1. "So that in looking at some apparently small object, one feels the swirl of great events"-William Carlos Williams, Essay "Marianne Moore" (1925)
Specificity.
2. "Poetry", Marianne Moore (1919)
"I, too dislike it"
3. "James Joyce has been wrongly subjected to indignity by stupid people"-Marianne Moore to Ezra Pound in a letter (1921).
She goes on in the letter to use stupid several more times. I like the bluntness.
4. "mongrel art"-Marianne Moore to Ezra Pound in a letter (1921).
This makes me think of what we made today during the calisthenics.
5. I am so sorry to have missed the game at the polo grounds but I miss so much, nearly everything, that I am hardened to loss"-Marianne Moore to William Carlos Williams in a letter (1935).
Connections of loss and losing from "One Art" by Bishop. This sentence comes after a discussion of WWII and Hitler.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Week 1, Sign Inventory
"One Art" Elizabeth Bishop
1. "Losing" and "Filled" in lines 1-2 suggest that loss can fill things. The suggestion seems to relate losing to a tangible object that acts and creates responses from other objects.
2. The three tenses in the 1st stanza: "losing", "lost" and "loss" insinuate more than one way of losing. There exists multiple ways into the art of losing something. The word "art" parallels multiple ways into creating and writing.
3. The speaker doles out advice and instruction in this poem. The pedagogical approach forces the reader to act as student.
4. The juxtaposition of the important with the mundane. For example, " lost door keys" and "the hour badly spent" suggests that losing isn't a specialized talent--anyone can do it.
5. The connection between the mundane and the important. For example, "lost door keys" and "the hour badly spent" read as the same thing. Looking for lost door keys turns into an hour lost.How can something small lead to something encompassing.
6. What if we replaced lose with write? "Write something every day". How is losing and writing similar? What do you lose when you write? Control?
7. Repetition (last and last, losing and losing, disaster, master). The art of repetition plays out in this poem insisting that the reader not forget, to not lose the words. The repetition makes the words easy to remember.
8. Punctuation in the last stanza stops the sing-song repetitious reading of this poem. First, the dash cuts this stanza away from the others. The parenthesis separates the things the speaker hasn't lost because she remembers them ("the joking voice, a gesture").
9. I think of Shelley and "Ozymandias". Once written down, words are not lost. Poetry directly confronts "the art of losing".
10. (Write it!) This poem concerns itself with the art of writing. Again, here the pedagogical voice of the poem switches to an encouraging mentor's voice.
1. "Losing" and "Filled" in lines 1-2 suggest that loss can fill things. The suggestion seems to relate losing to a tangible object that acts and creates responses from other objects.
2. The three tenses in the 1st stanza: "losing", "lost" and "loss" insinuate more than one way of losing. There exists multiple ways into the art of losing something. The word "art" parallels multiple ways into creating and writing.
3. The speaker doles out advice and instruction in this poem. The pedagogical approach forces the reader to act as student.
4. The juxtaposition of the important with the mundane. For example, " lost door keys" and "the hour badly spent" suggests that losing isn't a specialized talent--anyone can do it.
5. The connection between the mundane and the important. For example, "lost door keys" and "the hour badly spent" read as the same thing. Looking for lost door keys turns into an hour lost.How can something small lead to something encompassing.
6. What if we replaced lose with write? "Write something every day". How is losing and writing similar? What do you lose when you write? Control?
7. Repetition (last and last, losing and losing, disaster, master). The art of repetition plays out in this poem insisting that the reader not forget, to not lose the words. The repetition makes the words easy to remember.
8. Punctuation in the last stanza stops the sing-song repetitious reading of this poem. First, the dash cuts this stanza away from the others. The parenthesis separates the things the speaker hasn't lost because she remembers them ("the joking voice, a gesture").
9. I think of Shelley and "Ozymandias". Once written down, words are not lost. Poetry directly confronts "the art of losing".
10. (Write it!) This poem concerns itself with the art of writing. Again, here the pedagogical voice of the poem switches to an encouraging mentor's voice.
Week 1, Free Entry
I have been playing with some exercises from Writing Poetry: Creative and Critical Approaches
Page 97: Flat to Flesh
1. Off the coast, the water is sort of icky.
Mine: Sterile needles caress the sand.
2. The skunk looks into the trashcan.
Mine: The steamy buffet of trash waifs into the skunk's nostrils.
I just have to add this in from "Skunk Hour" by Robert Lowell
"She jabs her wedge-head in a cup / of sour cream"
3. The big monument bothers the people in the city.
Mine: The granite eye oversees the stifling city.
4. Ice moves out of the bay very slowly.
Mine: Creeping, the ice takes its final bow.
5. I looked through a bunch of stuff and saw the river out there.
Mine: The river wound through the oaken path.
Page 97: Flat to Flesh
1. Off the coast, the water is sort of icky.
Mine: Sterile needles caress the sand.
2. The skunk looks into the trashcan.
Mine: The steamy buffet of trash waifs into the skunk's nostrils.
I just have to add this in from "Skunk Hour" by Robert Lowell
"She jabs her wedge-head in a cup / of sour cream"
3. The big monument bothers the people in the city.
Mine: The granite eye oversees the stifling city.
4. Ice moves out of the bay very slowly.
Mine: Creeping, the ice takes its final bow.
5. I looked through a bunch of stuff and saw the river out there.
Mine: The river wound through the oaken path.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
Response to Laura Lindsay's Junkyard Week 1, Quote 1
I find the use of "mines" intriguing in this instance for several reasons. First, I love that a problem with correct usage led to a discussion where students were explaining and reasoning their own speech--with their language. Obviously, the students felt confident in their own speech to argue with the teacher regarding the use of the word "mines". Second, I think that it eludes to an underlying theme with students: Ownership and Identity. Clearly, this student identifies with the object, whatever it may be, her homework, her book bag, her lunch, and more importantly she identifies it as belonging to her and only her. Being an English teacher myself, I can't help but see the irony that the students were able to carry on a meaningful discussion about their language, correct or not. Then, the student continues to offer a reasoning behind her language (1. You know what it means and 2. It sounds good.). If you notice your explanation for correct usage never really gives a clear, determinate reason for WHY we say " I have my" instead of "I got mines". So, who really has this language thing figured out, the cringing teacher sweating at the board covered in dry erase marker or the student who knows just exactly what me and mines want to say?
Week 1, Calisthenics
Chapter 3: Assumptions from Triggering Town by Hugo
My Assumptions about my town:
My Assumptions about my town:
- All the dogs bark in unison.
- All shitzus bark in unison to Madonna songs.
- People cover their cars in Christmas lights to see at night.
- The town stays dark to see the falling stars.
- Everyone buys unleaded gas for their diesel engines.
- One armed stylists cut in the beauty shops.
- She used to be Miss America before she got fat.
- The barbers sing along with the dogs to "Material Girl".
- On November 1st, all the stores close.
- All the stores open on November 2nd with nothing to sell.
- Although thought to be named after a WWII hero, the town's namesake was a whore.
- All banks are connected to a taco/coffee stand.
- No one eats tacos or drinks coffee.
- Cereal hangs from trees on Easter.
- No one likes eggs or candy or rabbits.
- The mayor forbids white paper-only aquamarine or orange.
- The poker table runs the mayor.
- There is no mayor and never will be.
- Everyone eats egg salad on Tuesdays.
- No one eats on Tuesdays.
- The church eats every day.
Week 1, Improv
Elizabeth Bishop "At the Fishhouses"
The water seems suspended
above the rounded gray and blue-gray stones.
I have seen it over and over, the same sea the same,
slightly indifferently swinging above the stones
icily free above the stones
above the stones and then the world.
_________________________________________________________________
Words prize punishment
across the tortured white and dirty-white pages.
I have seen it push and push, the pale preponderance, the pale
politely purposefully playing above the pages
inkyly free across the pages
across the pages and then the tongue.
The water seems suspended
above the rounded gray and blue-gray stones.
I have seen it over and over, the same sea the same,
slightly indifferently swinging above the stones
icily free above the stones
above the stones and then the world.
_________________________________________________________________
Words prize punishment
across the tortured white and dirty-white pages.
I have seen it push and push, the pale preponderance, the pale
politely purposefully playing above the pages
inkyly free across the pages
across the pages and then the tongue.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Week 1, Pedagody Forum
At the first meeting, I appreciated how switching papers unnerved me. Thinking about this after class, I realized that to better ourselves as writers, nervousness helps. It forces writer accountability to someone else. The next day, I employed a similar technique in my class. The students switched papers to highlight and discuss their own writing they completed the week before. Mimicking the exercise of passing our papers certainly opened my eyes to how "safe" I play in when work shopping in my own classroom. Surprising to me, the students gladly accepted the help from their peers. Also, this allows students to practice the language of writing. So often, teachers posses this "secret" writing language, and we are the only ones to speak it. I can't wait to have my students practice this language more.
Week 1, Junkyard Entries
1. texative
A student asked me if they could use this work to describe themselves for an assignment. Of course! I love this word. It seems to really describe our youth today because they prefer texting to talking.
2. "in a hell / Not hell but earth" (Beowulf)
I am really drawn to this repetition. See next item.
3. "an old man sits netting,/ his net" or " herring / while he waits for a herring boat" (Elizabeth Bishop from "At the Fishhouses")
Something about this repetition in relation to Beowulf seems beautifully archaic. Even the repetition of "h" in Fishhouses just seems awkward in an interesting way.
4. "And his heart laughed, he relished the sight" (Beowulf)
My students related this to Grendel walking into the Golden Corral. A human trough.
A student asked me if they could use this work to describe themselves for an assignment. Of course! I love this word. It seems to really describe our youth today because they prefer texting to talking.
2. "in a hell / Not hell but earth" (Beowulf)
I am really drawn to this repetition. See next item.
3. "an old man sits netting,/ his net" or " herring / while he waits for a herring boat" (Elizabeth Bishop from "At the Fishhouses")
Something about this repetition in relation to Beowulf seems beautifully archaic. Even the repetition of "h" in Fishhouses just seems awkward in an interesting way.
4. "And his heart laughed, he relished the sight" (Beowulf)
My students related this to Grendel walking into the Golden Corral. A human trough.
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